So it Goes
by sharl-tn
Summary: Eames is an empath (obvious really), Arthur is a (seemingly emotionless) mystery, hijinks ensue? Really a bit of a drabble that I hope evolves to more, to be continued.
1. 1

01

...

The fingers were quick, efficient, a bit cold, thin digits pressing onto the vein lightly as the needle slid below them, then releasing, the ghost of the touch lingering on his inner arm briefly as the figure turned and moved to the next. Eames shifted in the chair, watching Arthur work his way around the team, studying as he bent beside each, motions so fluid but stilted, proper, personality hidden beneath the layers of perfectly tailored suits, no shifts or idle ticks to give away his inner thoughts, no hair out of place, no hints at even the most basic of preferences beyond the presented aesthetic.

Arthur turned, coming back towards the PASIV, and gave Eames a look, one eyebrow cocked slightly at his staring before muttering, "Go to sleep, Mr. Eames," and pressing the activation button.

The man was a goddamn mystery, and frankly it drove him nuts.

…

The team spread out within the testing ground – a pretty generic warehouse, dark brick, concrete floors, metal columns spanning into dark upper levels, shafts of light filtering through hazy gridded windows lighting up floating dust in the air. Eames turned around a column, running his fingers across the chipping paint and stepping into a grouping of furniture that had appeared ahead of him – two mirrors, free-standing metal frames, a heavy wood desk, and a rolling chair.

He waited, half-sitting on the edge of the desk, staring over at a puddle of light nearby until the sounds of the team's footfalls faded into the distance, and once he was sure he was alone, he took a breath, closing his eyes, and shifted.

He looked into the mirror, stood, and pulled down at a vest, reached up a hand to straighten a tie, took a step…

"Shit!" he cursed, looking down at his own shoe, before glancing back at the mirror to reveal his own form returned. He growled softly to himself, shaking his head. This was ridiculous. There was no explanation, but the broken forge was evidence enough that even after months of working jobs with Arthur, Eames still had no idea what kind of person Arthur was.

He landed, frustrated, in the rolling chair, half-heartedly practicing the forge of the mark he had mastered a week ago, waiting out the remaining dream time, thinking.

…

"I'm going for a walk." Eames muttered to no one in particular, grabbing his brown leather jacket from the edge of his desk, and making his way quickly to staircase. He pounded down the concrete treads and out the metal door at the base, almost sprinting with the urge to get outside.

It was dark, and cool, and he sucked the autumn air deep into his lungs, closing his eyes before releasing the frustrated sigh into the air, where it misted slightly in the reflected lights from the street. He slowed his steps to a reflective pace instead of the frustrated quick gait he had left with, walking nowhere in particular, just …away.

This shouldn't be possible, he thought angrily to himself.

Eames passed a couple making their way to the metro station, a flirty giggle in the air, the two of them projecting the show-off but earnest moments of an early relationship, or even a first couple dates, walking close together but still sharp, a little uncomfortable but hopeful, not quite touching but nearly so… he shook off the feeling as it ran across his senses, infecting him with the uneasy hesitation and doubt, and he just didn't need that on top of everything else.

He turned towards the river, water always seemed to help him center, there was something about the heaviness, the ever-changing but immutable nature of it that washed away the feelings that weren't his and helped him take a good look at where he was actually at. It was quiet, a weeknight by the emptiness of the street, not quite late, but well past key commuting times, and it was nice, calming.

He stepped up to the river wall, resting his forearms on the cool stone and staring down at the reflections of the buildings and lights distorted by the surface of the water.

This is ridiculous, and shouldn't be possible... He was an empath for fuck's sake, and after months of working jobs on and off with Arthur there was still nothing. No sense of who he was, no hints, no spare emotions… It had taken Eames a while to realize it, but it was definitely true.

Some people were quieter, their emotions more of a whisper, quickly over-ridden by others in the space, and if you weren't really focusing they were basically unreadable. And in Eames' defense, frankly Cobb was, well.. rather Loud, all tangled frustration, sharp hopelessness, drive, and desperation… it had quieted down a bit since the Fisher job, but Cobb was still often the easiest to pick up. After that it depended on who was in the room. Ariadne exuded her emotions, and it was a nice add to the team - her imaginative and contemplative nature pooled through their workspace, ebbing from her seat as she designed and figured out her mazes. Yusef's emotions were quiet but sparked up in moments of sarcasm, or flustered self-doubt, a more typical pattern where Eames was only conscious of him in snatches and quick pulses. Of all the various emotional signatures, Eames missed Mal the most; he had loved soaking up her smirking playful emotions, her impromptu touches transmitting her admiration for the craft of dream making or her love for her husband directly into Eames' skin, he never minded the intrusion, she was simply a delight.

So in all that colour, was it any wonder that he had assumed Arthur was just someone more quiet, and in the rush of their jobs and the trauma of the events of the last year, he just hadn't noticed that the 'quiet' was in fact 'silence'.

He hadn't noticed until the Fisher job if he was being honest. Prior to that, he had seen Arthur busy, had seen him driven, but he had never seen him in situations where he was genuinely frightened, or frustrated, or overwhelmed. That clusterfuck of a job had been littered with unique situations, and when Eames replayed the events in his mind afterwards he suddenly realized that his read of Arthur in those moments was based entirely on the physical cues, his expression in the warehouse when the threat of limbo hung above them, his shouted frustration to Cobb, the tight shoulders in the hotel in the midst of everything, or the indent of a half bitten lip as he calculated past Plan B to C, and D, or E… There had been no bleeding of emotions around these cues, no transmitted worry, and nothing beyond the surface level was read.

And since reflecting on that, it wasn't as if Eames hadn't been paying attention, pushing his luck with Arthur's patience as he tried to force a read through touch, lingering too long on a delivered coffee, petulantly insisting he needed help with the PASIV needle, trying to get a rise through a pat on the back, and still nothing but the physical read, nothing deeper, after months.

He sighed to the night air – maybe he was loosing his skills, using too much to reflect back their marks, surely the stress of back to back jobs, and only seeing Arthur in that context could play a part?

But who was he kidding, part of the reason he was a good forger (or as he liked to think to himself the Greatest forger) was the very empathy that coloured his every moment. It wasn't an exact science, but he'd always been a good read of people, and the more he leaned into that, the more he realized that the logical skips he was able to make, the deeper insights that just came to him, were so often tinged with definable emotions that could be articulated, categorized and interpreted at will.

He had forgotten where he'd heard the term 'empath', but the more he'd thought about it, the more things seemed to make sense, especially the emotional contagion he sometimes felt: when he would be suddenly frustrated, only to realize that the person beside him on the bus that was angrily texting, teeth clenched, and radiating those emotions towards him. Once he could pinpoint the source he was usually able to let it wash over him, but there was also a reason why between jobs he was the first to disappear, often taking some time to run off to a remote seaside or lake to settle and even out.

So this …thing… this issue, with Arthur, now that he was away from it for a moment, was he really willing to dig into why it irked him so? Was it purely curiosity, like picking away at a puzzle? Simply something to be sorted out and conquered? …not really…

Was it more that without the context he was missing key information critical to the team? Eames almost scoffed at that, as if he were that 'mission-focused'.

Altruism? How to know the perfect time to show up with a coffee or encouragement if he didn't have that intuition?

No… this was something else, and if he was being frank he could name it as something deeper, but he certainly wasn't going to dig farther into that… At least not right now...

He turned away from the water, working his way back to the warehouse, scrubbing the introspection to the side in favour of more planning, determination – this job was fairly simple, maybe he could eek out some time to try to solve this puzzle before the team split back out again – the 'greatest forger' couldn't really fail, this was just a learning moment. Eames smirked to himself, jamming his hands into his pockets and beginning to strategize options in his mind, once more confident that he could figure this out given enough time…

...

TBC


	2. 2

2

Of course, plans and reality are two different things. A couple months passed, the job went so well it was almost boring, and the team went their separate ways. If Eames was being honest it had almost been more annoying working with Arthur than before he had noticed the lack of read, every interaction, every accidental touch or attempt to get a rise resulted in more nothing.

So he was 'sulking' he supposed. Eames had never been a great fan of failure, and he figured he was due some distractingly aimless unemployment for a while. If he really probed that impulse, he might admit that he was mostly trying to get away from the empty feeling he couldn't help but notice now whenever Arthur was around, like the pressing silence of a sound-proof booth in contrast to the rest of the team. The minute the job had finished Eames was on a plane, and instead of seeking out his usual solitary haunts it was straight to a city, a bustling chaos of people and movement, one of his favourites, Hong Kong. At least here there were no gaps in sensation, and he swam through it with delight.

Hong Kong was a study in contrasts, one moment an impossible asian hub of activity and colour, sound and shops and houses beside more shops tangled together with food and construction sites and hotels and offices, but it was also a place where silence was easily found - if you ever needed to catch your breath you could rise above the close-pressed fray, three transfer elevators up a tower to breathe rarified air and gaze from green misted hillsides to gray ocean, where you could take two steps off a sidewalk and land in a quiet temple woven with impossibly ancient trees, where painted wood arches calmly surrounded the visitor with the weight of history and a silence annotated only by the smell of incense.

Eames walked the streets, up shining escalators through air conditioned malls filled with listless shop staff, gossiping school girls, and strolling shoppers, then on to a standing room only bus, packed with late arriving office creatures, all calm on the outside and impatient on the inside, and he would sit when the it cleared, beside old women with unassuming appearances but sharp intelligent eyes. He loved the emotional milieu, from calm to distracted, joyful to frustrated, anxious to wistful, and he savoured the feel of echoed britishness in the way people queued or the flavor of a well done milk tea, all woven together with a brightness of its own… and he stored away new gestures, following strangers shamelessly to master their mannerisms: the gait of a cell phone fixated tourist, the business-like chaos of a bike courier balancing take-out and weaving through traffic, the tired shamble of some overburdened expat carrying his dry cleaning and groceries through a crowd, projecting a bitter sort of …annoyance? resignation? Eames turned to examine closer, it was hard to get a clear read… and he stopped short, falling out of the rhythm of the street, watching as Arthur ducked over to a nearby building, waved a fob at a lock, and opened a door to an apartment block.

"Unbelievable." Eames muttered, shaking his head, mouthing some apologies to a pedestrian who was forced to veer at his sudden stop, as he quickened his pace, fingers wrapping around the edge of the glass door just before it shut and locked again.

His shoes clicked on the white tiles of the lobby as he jogged to catch up with Arthur, watching as he entered the elevator, still moving with a sort of listless gait, eyes downward. Eames thrust his elbow into the gap between the stainless-steel doors, stopping just outside the cab as they retracted back open at the motion. Arthur looked up, confusion creasing his features, mouth opening slightly in surprise, "What… are you doing here?"

Eames stepped into the elevator, feigning nonchalance, "I saw you on the street just now, what are the odds? I so rarely come to Hong Kong."

Arthur regained his composure quickly, straightening up from his tired hunch, shifting into his usual all-business posture with a soft scoff. "Yeah, what are the odds." He reached forward, tapped his key fob on a sensor, and hit the button for the 32nd floor. The elevator shifted, ascending. He turned to face Eames, arching an eyebrow in a half-hearted attempt at a glare, "Are you following me?"

Eames held his hands up, shaking his head, "No no no, I swear Arthur, it's pure coincidence – just saw you while walking, that's all." He dropped the smirk he'd pulled on out of habit and grasped for a sincere expression, "No games – I had no idea you had a place here."

Arthur nodded, sighed, a bit of a slump running back into his shoulders, as if he was resigning himself to the reality of the unexpected visit. "Fine." He passed Eames the suit bag as the elevator dinged the floor, "Hold this." The doors opened into a small lobby with a wood door that Arthur approached and put a key in, resettling his groceries into one hand before opening the door. Eames followed him inside, taking in the space as Arthur dropped the shopping bags on a kitchen island and toggled on some lights to reveal a surprisingly warm space, wood plank flooring, muted coloured walls, a modern kitchen dotted with plants and herbs, brown leather couch and chair over a plush-looking grey rug in a sitting room with carefully arranged books on two walls, and a view out towards the lights of the harbor and dark hillsides beyond. It was compact but cozy, well-designed but not cold or sharp like Arthur's typical dream constructions.

"Wow, Arthur, this is really nice…" Eames turned back to the kitchen, draping the suit bag carefully over the back of a chair, eyes settling on Arthur, trying to gauge his response.

Arthur made a quiet non-committal sound, absently filling a kettle with water and setting it to boil before turning back to the groceries, pulling items out and arranging them on the counter. Eames pulled himself up onto a stool, observing, curious why he hadn't received a string of sharp banter, or questions from the normally information-hungry point man across from him. Arthur pulled a can from the nearest bag, turned to place it on a shelf, then seemed to wobble slightly, one hand jumping out to grasp the edge of the counter, before the can tumbled from the edge of the shelf and onto the floor with a sharp bang. Eames was on his feet in an instant, picking up the now slightly dented can and coming up beside Arthur, "Hey, are you ok?" he said quietly, reaching out for Arthur's wrist where his hand still gripped the edge of the counter in a white-knuckled grasp. When his fingers touched the skin of Arthur's wrist Eames eyes widened in surprise, Arthur was shaking ever so slightly, and… there was a spark of emotion; jumbled but unmistakable, something like anger, embarrassment, and bone-deep weary resignation... But there wasn't time to dig into that now, Eames looked up, really looking at Arthur's face closely for the first time, taking in the paler than usual tint, the purple marks etched under each eye.

Arthur shook his head slowly, avoiding his gaze, "Been better." He turned away, pulling his wrist from Eames' hand and walking around the island. He hauled himself wearily into a seat and leaned forward, covering his face in his hands, elbows on the counter. In the silence that followed the kettle clicked off and Eames turned towards it, "Where do you keep your tea?"

Arthur tipped his head sideways in his hands revealing a skeptical eye, "I was going to make coffee."

"Umhmm," Eames hummed, opening cabinets before finding a few boxes of tea, pulling them out and selecting something herbal with two cups. Setting them on the counter he poured over the bags from the kettle and turned back to his reluctant host, "When's the last time you actually slept?" He let the question hang in the quiet of the apartment as he finished emptying out the groceries, placing some items in the cupboard and the rest in the fridge before folding up the bags and stacking them on the edge of the island. He pulled the tea bags out of the cups and placed one in from of Arthur before pulling himself up onto a stool across from him. "Well?"

It was unusual to see Arthur without his composure fully built up, but this wasn't the first time Eames had seen deep exhaustion mixed at a 1:1 ratio with the denial Arthur wore around him like a security blanket, on a particularly rough job a few years ago Arthur had nearly gotten pneumonia while trying to work through a flu, and until Cobb had taken him home and basically handcuffed him to a bed he had kept trying to work his way through it. Arthur sighed, lowering his hands and blowing across the top of his cup, "Give or take three days?"

Eames nodded, taking a sip of his tea, he could almost, almost, feel the emotion behind that statement, the lie in it _(_only _three days my ass)_, "Have you tried…"

Arthur cut him off, and Eames felt just a breath of the anger behind it, "anything you're going to say….. I've tried it." Arthur balled his free hand into a tight fist, taking a quick breath in before huffing it out in frustration.

Eames knew better than to offer up anything else, and they sat and drank their tea in relative silence. As he finished his cup, Eames rose and turned back to the kitchen, pulling out a few vegetables from the fridge, and setting a pot of rice to boil.

"You don't have to do that, Eames." Arthur muttered, eyes turning up from his mug.

"What are friends for?" Eames joked, easing some of his usual irreverence back into his tone, "Besides, I don't have anything going on, I'm currently unemployed, and I like to cook." He pulled a cutting board out of a holder, a knife from the wood block beside it and reached for the ginger, "Though, if you're not going to keep up your end of this visit with some classic Arthur repartee, we're going to have to take advantage of that television." He paused, turning back to face the raised eyebrow over half-hearted glare coming from Arthur, not so callous as to remain without a hint of invitation, returning the glare with a question in his features.

Arthur hesitated for only a moment before deflating, pushing back from the island, "Fine, just don't make a mess." He stalked away from the kitchen into what was probably the bedroom, and Eames turned back to his work, savouring the tiny but definitely present emotional colourings behind the words, exasperation and just barely noticeable, gratitude.

"As you wish, Darling," Eames called back with a smirk, laughing out loud at the answering slam of a door in response.

TBC


	3. 3

3

Arthur kept jerking up, starting awake.

Eames could see the motion in his peripheral vision, one minute Arthur's profile would be upright, alert, and the next, eyes closing, head bowing, and then the sudden motion upwards, the edges of his profile etched in the blue-grey light from the television.

"Arthur…" Eames started, tone flat, careful, "Why don't you lie down?" He didn't turn, didn't try to face him, keeping his eyes forward, as if the movement would elicit too much of a reaction.

And Arthur did the most unexpected thing. He sighed, a short sound, almost a whine, and abruptly pulled his legs up onto the couch, until his knees were pulled up in front of him, so he could rest his forehead onto the soft fabric of his sweat pants, curling his arms around his legs; a little ball of frustrated tired Arthur, self-contained and radiating his exasperation in tight waves of feeling. Quietly, merely a whisper, he muttered into his legs, "It won't work… I get a few minutes of rest and then it ends, I wake up, panic and…" he cut off, curling tighter.

Eames turns then, drawn to the wisps of emotion, resignation twisted with hopelessness – Arthur looked so small like this, and he reached up a hand, hesitated briefly, then completed the motion, laying his palm across the angular line of Arthur's nape, just above the edge of the t-shirt.

Arthur froze but didn't move, his breath coming in discontented puffs as he curled subconsciously tighter. Eames moved his thumb slowly back and forth in what he hoped was a calming motion – even with the direct contact the emotional signals had gone silent as Arthur had tensed. "You know," Eames tried for a casual tone, "I've never had it as bad as this looks… but I've been there: PASIV, especially after some of the shit we see, what we experience, it piles up and…"

Arthur twisted slightly with a quiet growl, and Eames knew better than to continue, pulling his hand back. "You think I don't know that?" Arthur lifted his head to glare at him before dropping his forehead back to his knees. "I just haven't had to deal with it in a long time, or…" he paused, and Eames could feel a bit of the hesitation? Embarrassment? No… it was …longing? …grief?

Eames couldn't help but turn, curious, trying to add visual information to confirm his emotional read, "…or?"

Arthur didn't move, but quietly replied, "a long time or, …without Mal." His shoulders drooped, arms pulling a tighter circle around his legs as he returned his head back to his knees.

"Oh..." Eames mouthed, turning his gaze forward, "she really was something… You knew her a long time, yes?" Eames knew bits and pieces of the story, that Arthur had been part of the PASIV program from its early days, alongside Cobb and Mal, that they had known each other, been a unit, a chosen family, since long before he had met them.

"Yeah." Arthur's words were quiet, muffled, but he turned his face to rest on its side, gazing over at Eames' profile, eyes glassy in the flickering light from the screen. "Met her in school, all the way back in Boston."

Eames cocked his head slightly at that, running the math quickly and turning to meet Arthur's gaze, "So before Cobb then?"

Arthur nodded. "She is… was…" he grimaced, "my closest friend."

Eames bit the edge of his lip, eyes squinting shut, struggling to hide his reaction to the wave of raw emotion that radiated from the curled-up form beside him alongside those words. Regret, anger, grief, longing, and bitter hopelessness, all at once like a gut punch, and then, just as quickly, gone. Like he'd imagined it. He clenched and unclenched the fist of his hand slowly in the darkness, before taking a slow breath and looking back at Arthur, "Arthur, she was exceptional, and… completely irreplaceable." Eames paused, trying to figure out how to broach what he wanted to say next. "Arthur, do you trust me?"

Arthur didn't move, didn't say anything, …still.

Eames moved, slowly, carefully shifting a little closer to Arthur's curled form, lifting his hand to the back of the couch to rest behind Arthur's back, "C'mon, we're at least friends…? Co-workers?" He nudged, probing.

Arthur closed his eyes, pausing for a long moment before opening them again, a rueful twist crossing his lips, "Fine, yes... Fine. …Any port in a storm, huh."

"That's the spirit," Eames replied gently, reaching forward again and placing his hand back at the top of Arthur's spine, this time applying a little pressure. "Just try, lie down, and we'll just…" Eames reached for a pillow with his free hand, placing it beside Arthur with a pat, "…see what happens."

After some jostling – it wasn't the biggest couch, Eames sat on one side, the pillow beside his waist, Arthur curled up, back to the cushions, on his side, lying down, but stiff, eyes open. Eames thumbed off the tv, placing the remote on the coffee table before pulling his sock-clad feet up onto it – he could hear Arthur's disapproving grunt, but he shrugged, "Just getting comfortable, Love, might be here a while."

As his eyes adjusted to the dark, the city's glow from the window giving blurry edges to the room, reducing the apartment to darks and lights. Arthur curled slightly and closed his eyes, pale profile accentuated by the dark of his hair, as Eames brought his hand down to rest on the joint between collarbone and neck, thumbing a light pressure up Arthur's spine before gently spreading his fingers into his hair – thicker than he'd imagined but with the liquid quality he'd expected, now confirmed. Always cataloging details, he muttered, "Any asian in you Arthur?"

Arthur shifted slightly, an exasperated but quiet groan escaping his lips, but at least his shoulders unclenched slightly, easing into the movement of Eames' fingers, "None of your damn business, forger."

Eames chuckled, "of course not." He continued the movement, gentle but with a little pressure, slow and focused; the tense joint where skull met spine, the edge of the hairline at the temple… with the tactile link he could feel as Arthur slowly, achingly slowly, began to relax, the thin strips of emotion becoming a more steady read, still jumbled but clearer than Eames had ever felt from him – and in the darkness he savoured it, cataloging the feel of Arthur's emotional landscape – so long silent, now quiet but definitely present… At first still ebbing frustration (at the lack of sleep, at Eames for being there, at needing help), then bitterness edged with the sharp edges of the grief Eames had felt earlier when Mal had come up, and beneath that a hollow sort of alone feeling, not quite loneliness but not unlike it – it was hard to define…

Eames was so concentrated on the read he barely noticed when Arthur fell asleep, until the feelings began to blur and quiet as his form uncurled slightly and relaxed. It was contagious, the dissolving lassitude snaking its way up his arm, Eames could feel his shoulders drooping, as his eyes closed and his head fell back to rest on the couch cushion behind him, fingers still curled between black locks.

They slept.


End file.
